Plate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au Roy

Plate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au Roy

Lamotte-Houdar

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Although he was not trained as a professional printmaker, Gillot found a robust market for his whimsical small-scale designs for book illustrations, which he often etched himself with remarkable fluidity. Here, he illustrates the opening lines of a fable by Antoine Houdar de La Motte in which fireworks set off from a large structure illuminate the night sky. The etching was included in La Motte's Fables nouvelles, dediées au roy, published by Gregoire Dupuis in 1719.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Plate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au RoyPlate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au RoyPlate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au RoyPlate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au RoyPlate for The Fish and the Fireworks, Fable Sixteen, in Fables Nouvelles, Dediées au Roy

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.